Here is a message (and trip report) my climbing partner Forrest wrote to Jim Nelson after we heeded his suggestion to make the second ascent of the N. Face of Colonial Peak.-------------------------------

Unfortunately for us, we did not heed your advice about hard snow conditions- the snow was hard in the trees and in the valley bottom, but as soon as wehit the snow slopes above the first rock band, we were postholing on everysnowfield all the way up. Minimum of 4-5 kicks per step. We kept thinking itwould get better, and it wasn't particularly slide prone, but it was veryslow and tiring. Where there was ice, however, it was generally solid.

Your description states 6-10 hours. I can only barely imagine anyone gettingup the route in 10 hours from the road in perfect conditions, much 6. Twightand Bebie took 5 hours on hard snow from the upper basin (you could easilybivy as high as 5000-5500 feet) - and anyone who could get from the car tothat point in less than 4 hours should be winning gold medals in theOlympics and not climbing mountains. Even in perfect conditions, its 3500vertical feet and a circuitous route which includes bushwacking. I would saythat 10 hours would be the absolute minimum, even if you soloed the lowerice. I think in good conditions, we could have done it a single continuous14-15 hour push, and we're reasonably fast climbers. With a half-bivy andthe crappy conditions we had, we took almost 31 hours from the car to thesummit. If we were super fit we could have shaved some hours, and saved somemore by not getting tired out by spending so much time ascending in toughconditions; but with the conditions last weekend, I don't think we couldhave cut that much off.

ApproachParking: There is no plowed pullout, we excavated a ramp in the plow-wall atcolonial creek campground and drove up off the highway. This took about 45minutes with shovels and ice axes. If there is no new snow, there is aslow-vehicle lane just east of Colonial Creek where some skiers parked thesame weekend, but I don't know what would have happened if they had had toplow. I guess a lot of years there is no snow here at all and you can parkin the campground, which is officially open all year, though not plowed out.

Approach: From about 50 feet south/east of the Bridge over Colonial Creek,head steeply up the slope, staying to the left of the sidehill that dropsinto the creek bed. After about 800 feet, after passing some small cliffbands, begin a gradual traverse parallel to the creek, breaking out of thetrees at the base of the open slopes at around 2700 feet.

Route: In between the valley bottom and the base of actual steep face is along snowy basin and a band of cliffs at valley level. There are many waysthrough this cliff band. From the head of the valley, a gully that leadssharply left accesses the snow fields without ice; there are several gullysystems that break the cliff bands in the middle, most of which lookclimbable. You could choose from WI 2 to WI 5, and if you wanted to, youcould climb as many as 4 or 5 pitches, but you could also get up to lowangled ground in 2 pitches or less in many spots. To us, the most appealingroute up to the mid-valley snow slopes was an obvious narrow, rock linedgully snakes through the snowslopes to the upper basin. Unfortunately, itended in a not-quite-touched-down ice pillar, so we did a short pitch upsome rock and cornices on the right side, then traversed sideways into thegully. This was fun, 20 degree alpine ice and hard snow with occasional"cruxes" of 35 degs. This gully fades out into snow slopes after a fewhundred feet.

Three features form the primary landmarks on the face: an overhangingcascade of ice in the middle of the lower face, and two ice pillars, onedirectly above the other. These features were connected by a complex seriesof steep snowfields. We soloed snow up to 50 degrees to the base of thecurtain. We bypassed this on the left, encountering snow of various depths,sometimes shallow, sometimes deep. We belayed one 20 foot section of mixedsnow and rock, then made a long rightwards traverse back on snow up to 60deg. to the base of the first pillar. The pillar is about 80 feet tall,consistently 80 degrees mixed alpine and water ice and quite sustained. Weencountered relatively thin ice, especially at the bottom. Rock belay belowand 15' left possible, but craftiness required. We placed one knifebladehere which we left fixed. Connect snowfields to the second pillar. 100'long, WI 3 or 3+, solid blue water ice. Traverse leftwards 400 feet to thebase of a short (40') moderate-mixed chimney which leads up to another shortsnowfield. Many possibilities; we crossed leftwards over a fin into a gully,which led directly upwards for 300 feet of real-deal mixed climbing. I haveno idea what to rate it, but it felt like climbing 5.10. Weave around thecornices at the top (some scary floundering inevitable) to reach theridgeline. (We traversed right under one cornice until we could turn it bythrowing a leg over and climbing it cowboy-style.) Follow the ridgelineanother 30 feet of very tricky mixed climbing to pop out onto the exactsummit.

Descent: Rather than a "col" between Colonial and Pyramid, there is more ofa high plateau formed by Pinnacle, Pyramid, Colonial and Paul Bunyon'sStump. This plateau is closed off from the lower basin by a terminalmoraine. To reach the lower basin without rapelling, it is necessary totraverse the edge of this basin (or follow the top of the moraine)(or do adescending traverse along the slope facing the Colonial Creek basin) all theway around (northwest) to below Pyramid Peak, then descend avalanche slopesto the valley floor. As far as we could tell, there is no more direct routethat would not require several rappels. This is pretty easy to scope outfrom the basin on the way up, but would be very hard to see in bad weatherand is not visible from above.

From here down is the more descriptive account, read only if you'reinterested...

Colonial Peak, North Face (Watusi Rodeo)2/12-1/23, 2000

After getting out of town pretty late Friday night, and the usual stops forgas, groceries, etc, we pulled up to the Colonial Creek campground around10:30. Since there is no plowed pullout for several miles, we spend 45minutes with shovels digging a ramp into the hard-packed snow so we coulddrive the car up and off the highway. It was beautifully clear, windless andcold, so we slept out next to the car. Though I was already sleepy, I sleptpoorly, continually woken up by vaguely menacing dreams.

We got up at 4:15, but weren't ready to move until 5:30. We hiked up theroad to Colonial Creek and prepared to head into the woods when I rememberedthat we hadn't packed the rope. It was still in Dan's ropebag, buried underour sleeping stuff. Dan went back to get it, and we headed into the brush onthe northwest side of the creek. 10 minutes later, Dan realized that he hadleft his second ice tool at the car. Back to the road. By the time we wereready the third time, it was 6:30 and just getting light. We figured that ifwe realized that we'd forgotten a third thing, it was a sign to go homeearly.

It actually worked to our advantage, though, because on second thought, wereally wanted to be on the other side of the creek. We headed up steeply forabout 800 feet through mostly open woods. Snow covered most of the brush,and was firm enough to generally support your weight without breakingthrough, except when it wasn't and you would break through into the air gapbeside a log or under a bush. After gaining most of the altitude on theslope perpendicular to the road, we struck a long, mostly level traverseinto the open basin, breaking out into the trees about two hours out of thecar.

A more avalanche-ridden valley I have never seen, the valley bottom filledwith piles of avalanche debris that had been torn and worn away by otheravalanches starting further up the valley. But the snow in the valley bottomwas firm - we thought that might mean good, hard snow up high. After all,the higher you go, the colder it is, right? A line of cliffs rings thevalley on the Colonial side, broken by a number of gullies. Only the ones atthe farthest ends of the valley lead through to the upper slopes withouttechnical ground. Frozen floes guard other gullies, enough that the basincould be a reasonable ice-cragging location in waterfall-deprivedWashington. We punted - the most appealing route up to the mid-valley snowslopes was a narrow, rock lined gully that unfortunately ended in anot-quite-touched-down ice pillar, so we did a short pitch up some rock andcornices, then traversed sideways into the gully. This was fun, 20 degreealpine ice with occasional "cruxes" of 35 degs. After a few hundred feet, wewere forced out of the gully onto the snow slopes and the work really began.Despite our hopes, the snow was soft. It didn't seem particularly slideprone - in fact we never saw any avalanche activity - but the going wasslow, requiring 4 or 5 kicks for every step. So we slowly worked our way uptowards the steep part of the north face proper.

The bushwack approach from the highway to the open basin gains about 1500feet. The cliff bands eat up perhaps 400 feet. The headwall itself is nomore than 2000 feet tall, depending on where you start counting. Since thesummit is 7800 feet, That leaves another 2500 feet of moderate angled snowthat separates the steep slopes above from the basin below. Those 2500 feetkilled our time. It was both slow and tiring, and in fact, the experiencewas extended onto the face itself. Hours crept by as we crept up steepeninggullies and snowfields. We finally put the rope on around 5800 feet. Threeprominent features are mentioned in the AAJ account of the climb and formthe primary landmarks of the face: an overhanging cascade of ice in themiddle of the lower face, and two ice pillars. The second pillar glowed blueeven from the valley bottom, but the first pillar glinted a dull brown,foreboding thin ice. These features were connected by a complex series ofsteep snowfields. Above the second pillar was the least clear portion of theroute. In Becky's guide, it is described as a "short mixed chimney, or aspectacular but scary pitch directly below the summit."

Bypassing the ice curtain on the left, as had Twight & Co, the snowfieldschanged from the gullies we had been soloing to rock slabs covered(sometimes deeply, sometimes shallowly) with snow. So we tied in to pass asketchy section, then continued simulclimbing back right and upwards towardsthe first ice pillar. We arrived at the base just at dark, having taken justone rest long enough to sit down in 12 hours. But we were less than halfwayup the face. We were climbing very slowly - the first ascent party sent theentire wall from the upper basin in five hours. We had hoped to summit in 14or 15 hours from the car, but given the snow conditions, that was not apossibility.

We needed a break, so we flattened out a small snow ledge under an overhang,put on all our clothes, and hunkered down. We made hot milk, hot couscousand tried to sleep, with a predictable lack of success. Around midnight, wehad had about as much "rest" as we could handle and started to stir. Wemelted snow and stared out into the night. Frequent spindrift avalanchespoured over our overhang. It was snowing lightly and verging on whiteoutconditions. I belayed Dan over to the base of the pillar, and we spent sometime getting in a bomber anchor, a continual problem in the crappy rock ofthe north face.

I have to say, psyching up to lead that pitch was the hardest part of theclimb for me. My headlamp wasn't strong enough to see the top, so I wasn'tsure how long it would be, but you could clearly see rock just below thesurface in many spots. It wasn't vertical, perhaps 80 degrees, but it wasconstant - no low-angle bulges to place gear from. Add to that that it was 2in the morning, snowing and in the middle of an alpine face, 80 feet of WI4was not exactly what I was in the mood for. I placed a screw standing at thebase that hit rock less than halfway in. It's a sickening feeling, becausenot only is it not all the way in, but unless you're lucky, you have to backit out half a turn to get the eye pointing downwards. I've read that if youcan get all the threads in the ice, it's better to clip the eye than to tieit off short because the strength of the threads resisting pulling out ismore important than the absolute shear strength of the screw itself.Whatever, either way its scary. Ten feet up I tried again, solid rock after2 inches. Already too high up to easily climb down, so up again. Finally asolid screw at 25 feet. Whew. Climbing by headlamp is odd, because with ahelmet and pack you can't direct the beam of your headlamp more than 10 feetabove you. The climbing was good, plastic water ice, and by meandering fromleft to right on the 15 foot wide flow, you could generally avoid verticalice. That is until the top, where a short vertical section was the onlyfeasible option in between hollow pockets on one side and black rock visiblejust below the surface on the other. In the end, I placed six screws, themost ever on a pitch - but only two of them were worth anything Iaccidentally put in a final one just below the top because I couldn't seethat I was just below the top. I was glad to have it, though, pulling offthe face. The sketchiest move on the pitch was as the angle eased, from onetool placement it went from solid water ice to bottomless sugar snow. Wellenough, as the angle was only 55 degrees, but trying to get mysolidly-placed lower tool out, with front points in below on ice and theother tool wallowing in loose crystals was a little terrifying. I ran therest of the rope out up snow to where some rocks emerged from the sidewall.

After Dan came up, we continued on, simulclimbing up more gullies. Somehow,I managed to make my memory of the face match the terrain, and we navigatedby the shortest possible route to the base of the second pillar. Again, thesoft snow slowed us way down and it was fully light by the time we reachedthe second pillar. It looked a lot more mellow, steep sections broken bylarge bulges and lower angled sections. Unfortunately, it wasn't quite as itappeared. True, there were lower angle sections, but since the first waslarger than it appeared, the average angle was actually greater than itappeared from below, and the steep portions were steeper. But in its favor,it was solid, thick, fat ice and none of the steep sections was more than 20feet before there was a lower angle bulge. Dan led it, his hardest ever icelead at WI 3 or 3+, not too shabby at 7400 feet on an only-climbed-oncenorth face.

From the top, a long sideways traverse leftwards on very steep (60 degrees?)snow put us directly below the summit, which we reached in one longsimulclimbing pitch. This was the coolest climbing on the face, continuallyhard, occasionally desperate, no-holds barred, mixed climbing. The mosttreacherous part was the constantly changing snow - sometimes it would behard enough to sink a tool into and hang completely, other times it wasloose and too unconsolidated to support any body weight at all. Rock moves,drytooling, it wal all legal on that pitch. At one point, you had totraverse under a small cornice on a subsidiary ridgelet. The problem was,there was only about three feet of snow below it, above the abyss. So youhad to duck-traverse sideways and down, bumping the underside of the cornicewith your helmet and pack, hoping it wasn't going to drop onto your head.The last few feet to the ridgeline were some of the hardest, gymnastic mixedmoves on rock and completely untrustworthy cornices of bottomless sugarsnow. Just like in the movies, literally as we stepped onto the summit, theclouds dissolved, revealing amazing views of seldom seen peaks likeSnowfield and Paul Bunyon's Stump and the hidden Neve Glacier. It was 1:00.

The descent was straightforward. Skis would have been nice as we sloggeddown beautiful slopes of shin-to-thigh deep powder. Everything suddenlyseemed different. We were off the face, it was sunny and beautiful. We werewarm, tired but no longer scared. Above 5000 feet, it had snowed more than 6inches while we were on the route. Fortunately, it was snowing ontorelatively low-avalanche-danger snowpack. Even so, we set off a few softwindslabs, although they were only the top 6 inches and so soft that theywould stop running after about 30 feet. The descent takes you all the wayaround the basin under Pyramid peak (to avoid those cliff bands), thenforces you to pick your way down 1000 feet of hard frozen avalanche debris.We slogged down the woods, tired and sore, arriving at the car at around 5.Dan performed a heroic feat of driving home without falling asleep; I triedto stay awake to keep up conversation, but I couldn't. The joy of sackingout in a warm bed? Indescribable.

Nice going on the second ascent. I went in about five years ago to check out this route and was turned back by poor snow conditions. Had I known it was waiting for a second ascent I might have been more persistent. Anyway, keep the posts coming, I enjoy reading about your exploits.